Sunday, August 22
Today was our day off to explore, so explore I did. After 8:00 Mass, Amy (from Ireland), David Six, Mike, Amy, and I hiked our way up into the punchbowls in the mountains. We left at about 9:00, climbed past the avocado farm, oil wells, river, cliffs, and finally to the punchbowls, where we took a nice refreshing (read: extremely cold!) swim. Amy (from Ireland) and Mike went back down because they hadn’t finished their reading for tomorrow yet, but as David, Amy, and I were all caught up, so we attempted to find the waterslides above the punchbowls. The punchbowls were about 3 miles from the school, and I remembered the waterslides being about 2 miles further. However, after a mile and a half the trail split. I followed the little stream up, eventually figured out it wasn’t going to be there, then went a different way that met a larger river. We later learned that the was the way, but in order to follow it involved waist-deep wading or rock-climbing, and my companions were not as eager about scaling cliffs as I was. We headed back down eating the oranges Tim had thoughtfully provided and got back at a about 2 after walking approximately 12 miles.